A RECORD OF SERVICE

STEVE IS A VETERAN and Advocate WITH THE RIGHT EXPERIENCE TO Represent US IN SACRAMENTO.

Steve has a lifetime of experience in the labor movement, military, Obama campaign, and White House, plus a record of progressive policy advocacy across California with leaders like Senator Bernie Sanders.

He has worked as the California Director of the Vet Voice Foundation, a national organization of 500,000 of veterans, family members, and active military that works to use the voices of Veterans to speak out on public policy issues such as the environment, healthcare, education, and civil rights. He’s played a key role in protecting our public lands from oil drilling interests, fighting for immigrant and LGBTQ rights, and barnstorming around California to lower drug prices, laying the groundwork for the single-payer healthcare campaign.

Steve grew up with parents who emphasized the importance of working hard, getting a good education, and being involved. Both his parents worked on the auto assembly line, his mother later opening a neighborhood flower shop, while his father served as the Chief Union Steward of his plant. Steve’s first political experience was handing out flyers for his dad’s union campaigns. His first job was working the cash register in his mother’s shop.

Steve graduated from public high school and then attended Kent State University, a college with storied tradition of activism. To serve his country and to pay the bills, he enlisted in the Air National Guard, which helped pay the bills. After 9/11, he went with his construction unit to Iraq, where he worked as a financial manager, handling millions of dollars in reconstruction contracts.

After 9/11, his unit was activated to serve in Iraq and build infrastructure there. In the absence of banks, Steve served as a financial manager. He was entrusted with making trips with $1 million cash slung over his shoulder to pay contractors.

Soon after his return, he heard a young Senator named Barack Obama courageously proclaim it was time to end the “tyranny of oil” in front of a group of autoworkers. Steve was inspired to join his presidential campaign in Iowa in early 2007 and organized in seven states across the country for the next two years, managing dozens of staff and volunteers. As an official in the Obama administration, he launched a program to get jobs for veterans in the energy sector and briefed senior White House staff.

Since then, Steve has been on the frontlines of progressive fights to secure single-payer healthcare and achieve 100% renewable energy. He traveled around California with Bernie Sanders for affordable healthcare and played a pivotal role the preservation the San Gabriel Mountains as a national monument. In Sacramento, in DC, and in his own LA community, he’s worked closely with dozens of partners to get things done.

He is committed to uniting our incredibly diverse district around our shared progressive values. Together we will lead the resistance to Trump's policy and make California into a model of progress for how we can take care of each other and our environment.